LAFAYETTE, La.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Emergency Care Partners (“ECP”), a leading regional provider of emergency medicine and outsourced emergency department management services to hospital facilities across Louisiana, today announced a strategic merger with Progressive Emergency Physicians (“PEP”), a leading Long Island, New York based provider of outsourced emergency department management services to care facilities across New York and Pennsylvania. The combined super-regional emergency medicine platform – which is to be headquartered in Pensacola, Florida - will service departmental operations at 19 hospitals across Louisiana, New York, and Pennsylvania, supported by a combined clinical workforce of 194 physicians and 216 mid-level providers, treating in excess of 670,000 ER patient visits annually. Simultaneous with the closing of the transaction, PEP’s Dr. Andrew Sama will join the executive leadership of ECP, while both Dr. Sama and PEP’s Dr. David Kim will join the corporate Board of Directors of ECP.
In terms of strategy, the combined business will continue its service intensive approach to managing small/medium-sized emergency departments, leveraging ECP’s unique business model that combines local physician equity partnerships and ECP’s differentiated technology platform to ensure local service accountability and care quality at each ECP facility served. Further, ECP’s physicians – including legacy physician partners from the former PEMM and PEPA groups and those from the newly absorbed PEP operations - will continue to be meaningful shareholders in the combined company.
ECP is backed by Varsity Healthcare Partners (“VHP”), a lower middle market healthcare services private equity investment firm with expertise in growing care provider platforms, who provided additional growth equity capital to fund the PEP transaction, along with Regal Healthcare Capital Partners, a New York-based healthcare services growth equity and buyout firm founded by Jon Santemma – former Head of Jefferies Healthcare Investment Banking practice – and Dr. David Kim, former CEO and co-founder of Premier Urgent Care.
Shepard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP acted as legal adviser to ECP and VHP, while Nexus Health Capital and Greenburg Traurig, P.A. acted as financial and legal advisors, respectively, to PEP.
In addition to the PEP transaction, ECP appointed Bill Yarbrough as Chief Executive Officer of the Company and a member of the Company’s Board of Directors, effective immediately.
Mr. Yarbrough brings to ECP more than 20 years of healthcare management experience and a successful track record of partnering with physician groups and clinical leaders to create long-term relationships with hospitals and health systems. Most recently, Mr. Yarbrough served as Executive Vice President at Envision Physician Services, a leading national provider of physician-led services and post-acute care, and ambulatory surgery services, where Mr. Yarbrough held senior management and operational responsibility for more than 150 physician group practices in 31 states, supported by a workforce of more than 2,000 providers.
About Emergency Care Partners
Based in Pensacola, Florida, Emergency Care Partners (“ECP”) is a leading regional provider of emergency medicine and emergency department management services to hospitals and other free standing care facilities. The company was initially formed through the joint recapitalization of Professional Emergency Medicine Management (PEMM) and Professional Emergency Physicians Associates (PEPA), both Louisiana-based, clinically differentiated emergency medicine providers, and owned at inception by Varsity Healthcare Partners, in partnership with PEMM’s/PEPA/s founders and partner physicians.
About Varsity Healthcare Partners
Varsity Healthcare Partners (VHP) is a lower middle-market private equity investment firm focused on partnering with founders, entrepreneurs and management teams to build leading healthcare services companies. VHP has been successful in developing and executing a tailored value-creation plan, in partnership with the leadership of each company that typically emphasizes investments in infrastructure followed by an aggressive organic and acquisition growth strategy. VHP draws upon its extensive healthcare industry experience and relationships, as well as its hands-on partnership approach to effectively drive growth and maximize value. For more information please visit: www.varsityhealthcarepartners.com.
About Regal Healthcare Capital Partners
Regal Healthcare Capital Partners is a lower middle market focused growth equity and buyout firm which seeks to partner with leading edge healthcare entrepreneurs who are in need of financial investment and strategic, operational and managerial expertise. Regal’s Co-Founders, Dr. David Kim and Jon Santemma, bring a unique combination of operational and transactional experience to healthcare services companies seeking to realize their growth potential. For more information, please visit: www.regalhcp.com.